Wednesday, March 02, 2011

Sure. I imagine people were just hallucinating when they saw this guy choking his wife on the hood of their vehicle. He was just standing there minding his own business and all of a sudden the police are slapping cuffs on him.

The controversy surrounding Howard Bryant's arrest is not over, as the ESPN writer's lawyer is fighting back against the allegations that Bryant assaulted his wife outside a restaurant in Buckland, Mass.

According to recorder.com, Bryant's lawyer Buz Eisenberg claims that race was a factor in the arrest, insisting that the police officer involved did not completely investigate the situation.

"Mr. Bryant was the victim of excessive force," Eisenberg said after Bryant's arraignment on Monday in Greenfield, Mass. ''[Police] responded to the scene and rather than do an investigation they made an arrest of a black man with a white wife."

Bryant pleaded innocent to charges of domestic assault and battery, assaulting a police officer and resisting arrest on Monday. He was released on personal cognizance.

Bryant's wife, Veronique, says she is not pressing charges against her husband of nine years and told the Boston Herald that she has never been a victim of abuse.

"I'm not a victim of abuse -- never been," she said in a phone interview. "Not now. Not ever."

Massachusetts State Police's director of media communications David Procopio responded to the Eisenberg's race claim, defending the arrest made by state troopers.

While Bryant offers his denial and race card, five witnesses reported he was choking her.

The trouble started, Procopio said, when state police received multiple calls from witnesses saying a man had put his hands on a woman's neck, pushed her against a parked vehicle and pinned her there.

Authorities responded within two minutes, he said. When a state trooper asked Bryant to put his hands behind his back, he refused, Procopio said. Bryant resisted arrest and struck one officer in the chest with his elbow, he said. Eventually, the state trooper, a Massachusetts state police sergeant and two local police officers subdued Bryant with an "armlock" and placed him chest down on the hood of his car, he said.

Bryant was handcuffed, read his Miranda rights and taken to the Shelburne Falls state police barracks where five witnesses gave statements, said Procopio.